A Sampling Of Arab Reaction To Saddam's Capture

Being the curious sort I am, I decided to go over and take a look at the Arab reaction to Saddam's capture as reported in the Arab News. The page is very slow to load, but it is interesting nonetheless.

At first, the article has all the expected quotes of praise from various officials. But towards the end there are a couple of interesting quotes:

"It is happy news but we wish it were the Iraqi people who had captured him, not US troops, because this will give Bush a boost in the upcoming election," said Bahraini salesman Hussein Jaafar.

"I don't like Saddam, but as an Arab I wouldn't like to see them (Americans) dragging him around Baghdad," said Syrian student Abdul-Nasser.

The first quote is interesting, but not really all too surprising. I've seen quite a few Americans making very similar statements. The "I Hate Bush"™ crowd is working itself into an absolute fit over the capture.

The second quote is the one that really, I think, highlights a big problem in our relationship with that part of the world. Remembering history is one thing. Trying to live in a historical era that no longer exists is another.

Christians already have to overcome the Muslim perception that we are on a perpetual Crusade. They never acknowledge that the Crusades ended hundreds of years ago. We no longer fight a Crusade, but because the Muslim world will not accept or acknowledge that fact, we must constantly fight the perception that we are Crusaders.

The second quote harkens back, not to the Middle Ages, but rather two millennia to ancient Rome. Rome used to hold triumphs in which captives were paraded around captured cities and/or Rome for public spectacle.

America does not do that. Yet we have to fight the perception that in our triumphs, we will be holding a Triumph. There is no recognition of a difference between the subjugation of Vespasian and the liberation of Bush. There is no realization that we are not there to dominate.

How many misunderstandings between our two cultures are rooted in this persistence? Probably more than a few.

Looking back for historical parallels or historical guidance is never a bad idea, but life still has to be lived in the present.

America has not paraded Saddam and is not going to. He will be treated with the respect and dignity to which he has shown himself to be singularly unworthy of. It's too bad that large swaths of Islamic society will ignore that fact in their zeal to find the proof of the new Christian Crusade or of Roman style Imperialism.

History is history.